llow children to transition, or they will kill themselves. For more than a decade, this has been the strongest argument in favor of youth gender medicine—a scenario so awful that it stifled any doubts or questions about puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.
But there is a huge problem with this emotive formulation: It isn’t true. When Justice Samuel Alito challenged the ACLU lawyer Chase Strangio on such claims during oral arguments, Strangio made a startling admission. He conceded that there is no evidence to support the idea that medical transition reduces adolescent suicide rates.
Here was the trans-rights movement’s greatest legal brain, speaking in front of the nation’s highest court. And what he was saying was that the strongest argument for a hotly debated treatment was, in fact, not supported by the evidence.
When red-state bans are discussed, you will also hear liberals say that conservative fears about the medical-transition pathway are overwrought—because all children get extensive, personalized assessments before being prescribed blockers or hormones. This, too, is untrue. Although the official standards of care recommend thorough assessment over several months, many American clinics say they will prescribe blockers on a first visit.
Perhaps the greatest piece of misinformation believed by liberals, however, is that the American standards of care in this area are strongly evidence-based. In fact, at this point, the fairest thing to say about the evidence surrounding medical transition for adolescents—the so-called Dutch protocol, as opposed to talk therapy and other support—is that it is weak and inconclusive.
Yes, as activists are keen to point out, most major American medical associations support the Dutch protocol. But consensus is not the same as evidence. And that consensus is politically influenced.
The reliance on elite consensus over evidence helps make sense of WPATH’s flatly hostile response to the Cass report in England, which commissioned systematic reviews and recommended extreme caution over the use of blockers and hormones.
Can this misinformation bubble ever be burst? On the left, support for youth transition has been rolled together with other issues—such as police reform and climate activism—as a kind of super-saver combo deal of correct opinions.
Some advocates for the Dutch protocol, as it’s applied in the United States, have staked their entire career and reputation on its safety and effectiveness.
For everyone else, however, the choice is still open. We can support civil-rights protections for transgender people without having to endorse an experimental and unproven set of medical treatments—or having to repeat emotionally manipulative and now discredited claims about suicide.
Source: The Liberal Misinformation Bubble About Youth Gender Medicine – The Atlantic